Teaching about the Native Americans: How to Start

In December, it was time to move on from geography and into the study of Native American culture and way of life at the start of our nation’s history.  I look forward to this unit every year with a mixture of delight and trepidation.  There are so many awesome opportunities for project-based learning, however, there seem to be an equal number of ways to perpetuate stereotypes.  I have tried hard to fill in the gaps of my own understanding of the earliest Americans, so that I can teach a more balanced view of the past.

I realized quickly in my first year that telling my students we would be studying the Native Americans gave them a false sense that we were studying a people who no longer existed.  So in my second year, I made to sure to begin our unit in the present.  We had just finished studying world geography, and so I asked children if they knew which countries their ancestors were originally from and why they came to the United States.  Even my 3^rd graders whose grandparents and great-grandparents were born here, were able to think about how these relatives lived years ago, and how things about them changed with the times.  Wouldn’t this be similar for the Native American people? 

It was a successful conversation that helped children to think about the place the earliest Americans have in our current history.  It helped them understand that we talk about their past, because it affects all of our pasts as US citizens, but it does not mean that the Native Americans have disappeared or that they live the same way they once did hundreds of years ago. 

From doing my research online and listening to the ideas of other teachers, I went from the present to the very past.  Through PowerPoint, I spoke to my students about the land bridge, how the earliest Americans were nomads who were believed to have followed the wooly mammoth from Asia to North America and how later people perhaps came by sea down the coasts.  Here are some of the slides I used.  Guess which one was their favorite.

We talked about how our world has changed over time, how the continents have moved and how this affected the earliest people.

We talked about how if we look at today's map from a different perspective we see how close Asia and North America truly are.  We have an easier time picturing "beringia" - the land bridge.

We talked about how this land bridge melted and reformed over and over again over time, until eventually it had disappeared.

We talked about how it is believed that the earliest Americans followed their food source - the wooly mammoth.

...But not like this.

And finally, we looked at a map of North America divided by regions in which the earliest Americans settled, and made a list of natural resources the people might have had available to them depending on their location.

So how do you wrap up a lesson that is mostly discussion?!  Sometimes we don't have time for children to fill out comprehension worksheets and sometimes those sheets seem repetitive.  Still, I want to know that my students have followed along.  My tool is the "Roll and Write."  At the end of class, (though sometimes the beginning as a warm up), I ask each table to roll the die once.  Whichever number they land on is the question they must answer.  You can differentiate this day to day! Sometimes I let them work as a group and write their answer on an index card.  Other times they have to answer it individually.  Either way, it is a great way for me to quickly assess what material has really sunk in!  I have a great reward system for those who have the correct answer but I'll save that for another time. 

This is what the "Roll and Write" slide looks like.  I save for the last 5 minutes of class,
or open with it to review a previous lesson.  

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This year I was also able to introduce the unit with a visit from the Redhawk Native American Arts Council’s performing artists.  If you are in the New York area this organization has a wonderful program for children of all ages.  The dance troupe visited our school and spoke about the stereotypes we often have about Native Americans, while getting our students out of their seats for some interactive dances.  Visit http://redhawkcouncil.org/ for more.